Levines

I am reading the autobiography of Yakima Canutt, a stuntman and violence designer from the Golden Age of Hollywood. He spends a little time talking about a producer he worked with, one Nat Levine.

Nat Levine was not only a sharp operator, he knew how to handle people. He could get more work out of a crew than anyone I have ever known. Sometimes he would come out with the kind of impossible order that would ordinarily send people into tantrums. However, with Nat's crews and actors, it would have the opposite effect. They would laugh it off and Nat would laugh with them. He was a shrewd businessman who had a keen appreciation for what people were going through.

I have to wonder if this Nat was an ancestor of the Ken Levine I worked with. Eventually, Ken could no longer get insane amounts of work out of *me*, but his general skills in that department were impressive. If only he’d used those powers for good…